Wordsworth’s 1805 Prelude, Book 11: “Habits of devoutest sympathy”

Long time hath man’s unhappiness and guiltDefained us: with what dismal sights besetFor the outward view, and inwardly oppressedWith sorrow, disappointment, vexing thoughts,Confusion of the judgement, zeal decayed –And last, utter loss of hope itselfAnd things to hope for. Not with these beganOur song, and not with these our song must end.Ye motions of delight, that through the fieldsStir gently, breezes and soft airs that breatheThe breath of paradise, and find your wayTo the recesses of the soul; ye brooksMuttering along the stones, a busy noiseBy day, a quiet one in silent night;And you, ye groves, whose ministry it isTo interpose the covert of your shades,Even as a sleep, betwixt the heart of manAnd the uneasy world – ’twixt man himself,Not seldom, and his own unquiet heart –Oh, that I had a music and a voiceHarmonious as your own, that I might tellWhat ye have done for me. The morning shines,Nor heedeth man’s perverseness; spring returns –I saw the spring return, when I was deadTo deeper hope, yet had I joy for herAnd welcomed her benevolence, rejoicedIn common with the children of her love,Plants, insects, beasts in field, and birds in bower.So neither were complacency, nor peace,Nor tender yearnings, wanting for my goodThrough those distracted times: in Nature stillGlorying, I found a counterpoise in her,Which, when the spirit of evil was at height,Maintained for me a secret happiness.Her I resorted to, and loved so muchI seemed to love as much as heretofore –And yet this passion, fervent as it was,Had suffered change; how could there fail to beSome change, if merely hence, that years of lifeWere going on, and with them loss or gainInevitable, sure alternative?

Book 11, 1-41

Oh soul of Nature, excellent and fair,That didst rejoice with me, with whom I tooRejoiced, through early youth, before the windsAnd powerful waters, and in lights and shadesThat marched and countermarched about the hillsIn glorious apparition, now all eyeAnd now all ear, but ever with the heartEmployed, and the majestic intellect!O soul of Nature, that dost overflowWith passion and with life, what feeble menWalk on this earth, how feeble have I beenWhen thou wert in thy strength!

Book 11, 138-149

Amid the turns and counter-turns, the strifeAnd various trials of our complex beingAs we grow up, such thralldom of that senseSeems hard to shun; and yet I knew a maid,Who, young as I was then, conversed with thingsIn higher style. From appetites like theseShe, gentle visitant, as well she might,Was wholly free. Far less did critic rulesOr barren intermeddling subtletiesPerplex her mind, but, wise as women areWhen genial circumstance hath favored them,She welcomed what was given, and craved no more.Whatever scene was present to her eyes,That was the best, to that she was attunedThrough her humility and lowliness,And through a perfect happiness of soul,Whose variegated feelings were in thisSisters, that they were each some new delight.For she was Nature’s inmate: her the birds,And every flower she met with, could they butHave known her, would have loved. Methought such charmOf sweetness did her presence breath aroundThat all the trees, and all the silent hillsAnd every thing she looked on, should have hadAn intimation how she bore herselfTowards them and to all creatures. God delightsIn such a being, for her common thoughtsAre piety, her life is blessedness.

Even like this maid, before I was call forthFrom the retirement of my native hillsI loved whate’er I saw, nor lightly loved,But fervently – did never dream of aughtMore grand, more fair, more exquisitely framed,Than those few nooks to which my happy feetWere limited. I had not at that timeLived long enough, nor in the least survivedThe first diviner influence of this worldAs it appears to unaccustomed eyes.I worshipped then among the depths of thingsAs my soul bade me; could I then take partIn aught but admiration, or be pleasedWith any thing but humbleness and love?I felt, and nothing else; I did not judge,I never thought of judging, with the giftOf all this glory filled and satisfied –And afterwards, when through the gorgeous AlpsRoaming, I carried with me the same heart.In truth, this degradation – howsoe’erInduced, effect in whatsoe’er degreeOf custom that prepares such wantonnessAs makes the greatest things give way to least,Or any other cause that hath been named,Or, lastingly, aggravated by the times,Which with their passionate sounds might often makeThe milder minstrelsies of rural scenesInaudible – was transient. I had feltToo forcibly, too early in my life,Visitings of imaginative powerFor this to last: I shook the habit offEntirely and for ever, and againIn Nature’s presence stood, as I stand now,A sensitive, and a creative soul.

There are in our existence spots of time,Which with distinct preeminence retainA renovating virtue, whence, depressedBy false opinion and contentious thought,Or aught of heavier or more deadly weightIn trivial occupations and the roundsOf ordinary intercourse, our mindsAre nourished and invisibly repaired –A virtue, by which pleasure is enhanced,That penetrates, enables us to mountWhen high, more high, and lifts us up when fallen.This efficacious spirits chiefly lurksAmong those passages of life in whichWe have had deepest feeling that the mindIs lord and master, and that outward senseIs but the obedient servant of her willSuch moments, worthy of gratitude,Are scattered everywhere, taking their dateFrom our first childhood – in our childhood evenPerhaps are most conspicuous. Life with me,As far as memory can look back, is fullOf this beneficent influence.At a timeWhen scarcely (I was not then six years old)My hand could hold a bridle, with proud hopesI mounted, and we rode towards the hills:We were a pair of horsemen – honest JamesWas with me, my encourager and guide.We had not travelled long ere some mischanceDisjoined me from my comrade, and, through fearDismounting, down the rough and stony moorI led my horse, and stumbling on, at lengthCame to a bottom where in former timesA murderer had been hung in iron chains.The gibbet-mast was mouldered down, the bonesAnd iron case were gone, but on the turfHard by, soon after that fell deed was wrought,Some unknown hand had carved the murderer’s name.The monumental writing was engravenIn times long past, and still from year to yearBy superstition of the neighbourhoodThe grass is cleared away; and to this hourThe letters are all fresh and visible.Faltering, and ignorant where I was, at lengthI chanced to espy those characters inscribedOn the green sod: forthwith I left the spot,And, reascending the bare common, sawA naked pool that lay beneath the hills,The beacon on the summit, and more near,A girl who bore a pitcher of her headAnd seemed with difficult steps to force her wayAgainst the blowing wind. It was, in truth,An ordinary sight, but I should needColours and words that are unknown to manTo paint the visionary drearinessWhich, while I looked all round for my lost guide,Did at that time invest the naked pool,The beacon on the lonely eminence,The woman, and her garments vexed and tossedBy the strong wind. When, in the blessèd season,With those two dear ones – to my heart so dear –When, in the blessed time of early love,Long afterwards I roamed aboutIn daily presence of this very scene,Upon the naked pool and dreary crags,And on the melancholy beacon, fellThe spirit of pleasure and youth’s golden gleam –And think ye not with radiance more divineFrom these remembrances, and from the powerThey left behind? So feeling comes in aidOf feeling, and diversity of strengthAttends us, but once we have been strong,

Oh mystery of man, from what a depthProceed thy honours! I am lost, but seeIn simple childhood something of the baseOn which they greatness stands – but this I feel,That from thyself it is that thou must give,Else never canst receive. The days gone byCome back upon me from the dawn almostOf life; the hiding-places of my powerSeem open, I approach, and then they close;I see by glimpses now, when age comes onMay scarcely see at all; and I would giveWhile yet we may, as far as words can give,A substance and al ife to what I feel:I would enshrine the spirit of the pastFor future restoration. Yet anotherOf these to me affecting incidents,With which we will conclude.

One Christmas-time,The day before the holidays began,Feverish, and tired, and restless, I went forthInto the fields, impatient for the sightOf those two horses which should bear us home,My brothers and myself. There was a crag,An eminence, which from the meeting-pointOf two highways ascending overlookedAt least a long half-mile of those two roads,By each of which the expected steeds might come –The choice uncertain. Thither I repairedUp to the highest summit. ’Twas a dayStormy, and rough, and wild, and on the grassI sate half sheltered by a naked wall.Upon my right hand was a single sheep,A whistling hawthorn on my left, and there,With those companions at my side, I watched,Straining my eyes intensely as the mistGave intermitting prospect of the woodAnd plain beneath. Ere I to school returnedThat dreary time, ere I had been ten daysA dweller in my father’s house, he died,And I and my two brothers, orphans then,Followed his body to the grave. The event,With all the sorrow which it brought, appearedA chastisement; and when I called to mindThat day so lately past, when from the cragI looked in such anxiety of hope,With trite reflections of morality,Yet in the deepest passion, I bowed lowTo God who thus corrected my desires.And afterwards the wind and sleety rain,And all the business of the elements,The single sheep, and the one blasted tree,And the bleak music of that old stone wall,The noise of wood and water, and the mistWhich on the line of each of those two roadsAdvanced in such indisputable shapes –All these were spectacles and sounds to whichI often would repair, and thence would drinkAs at a fountain. And I do not doubtThat in this later time, when storm and rainBeat on my roof at midnight, or by dayWhen I am in the woods, unknown to meThe workings of my spirit thence are brought.

Thou wilt not languish here, O friend, for whomI travel in these dim uncertain ways –Thou wilt assist me, as a pilgrim goneIn quest of highest truth. Behold me thenOnce more in Nature’s presence, thus restored,Or otherwise, and strengthened once again(With memory left of what had been escaped)To habits of devoutest sympathy.